Dishonored 2 lives and dies by its level design. Tricky guard patrols and magical abilities don’t mean much without a good playground to sneak around in. Luckily, the game has one of the best levels in recent memory: the transforming Clockwork Mansion.

I’ve been thinking a lot about Rage lately. Last week, I dove back in. Minutes became hours, and I soon realized I was having a blast. When I was finally done, I had to ask: why doesn’t Rage get the love it deserves?

I stayed perfectly still after they chased me into the air vent. I hadn’t heard anything for several minutes. Surely they’d left by now. Crawling out of my hiding spot, I found myself face to face with one of my pursuers. He hadn’t moved. He started shouting, but he remained locked in place, unable to move at all. …

When it comes to engrossing the player into an interactive game world, the choice of perspective can have a massive impact on how gamers experience the various scenarios they find themselves in. Perspective serves as the graphical gateway into the virtual environment that players shall be exploring and shapes the way…

“Jenga.” Depending on where you’ve played it, the very word conjures up memories of family holiday gatherings or boozy dorm room parties. But, if Hasbro had its way, the world-famous tower game would have a different name.

Jump scare me with zombie dogs, taunt me with shrieks and gurgles or shock me with grotesque imagery all you want — I'm not truly tense until the telltale signs of a virtual ass-whupping start showing up.

Rarely, if ever, do we think about the mental state of the creator/s and how the design and building of a game impacted them. We take it for granted, perhaps, that their sole purpose in creation is to provide something that affects us.

Frog Fractions creator Jim Crawford gave a presentation titled Preserving a Sense of Discovery in the Age of Spoilers. You can watch it
here, or read a transcript here. He recommends several games that illustrate his rules of game design. My favorite example:

Usually, when you hear about games that never make it out into the world, you get a few screenshots. Maybe a trailer teasing what might have been. But the dev studio behind Heavenly Sword and DmC are showing damn near all the work they did on a title that never saw the light of day. It's great reading for anyone…

Kotaku has featured Bounden before. It's an upcoming game that relies on two people using an iPhone to work together to dance (or just end up tied in knots). It's supposed to be released May 21 for iOS and Android, but that's easier said than done:

TwinSky Games is currently working on upcoming mobile game Adventure Time: Time Tangle. The game's core mechanic is punching, so the developers combined several effects to make the punching feel algebraic:

Walking and jumping. Shooting. Having virtual people and things follow you around. These kinds of bedrock mechanics are so ubiquitous in modern video games that it's easy to take for granted that they just work. A new website gives people a glimpse at the mechanics implemented in extremely raw fashion. It's totally…